Be Still
by Force Unbroken
Summary: He knew there would be fallout. He just wasn't expecting it to be quite like this. Post 2.11, "Poster Boy".


_Wow. So, it's been three years since I last managed to post anything on this site, but I can honestly say that it feels like coming home. This is my first attempt at Major Crimes, and I'm a little bit rusty (if you'll pardon the pun), but this story - which started out as a short little scene between Rusty and Sharon - had a mind of its own, and more than six thousand words later, here we are. To Phantom Rosabelle and SChimes, thanks for forming the Unholy Trinity with me, and to Aphelionite, thanks for kicking my butt and telling me to just "be still and write!" when I needed the encouragement. You guys are the best. And without further ado, here's my contribution to the Unholy Collection of Angst. *grins*_

_Title and lyrics are borrowed from The Fray._

**_Disclaimer: ...Yeah, right._**

* * *

**Be Still**

* * *

_If terror falls upon your bed, and sleep no longer comes…_

* * *

When the clock strikes two and sleep still hasn't found him, Rusty gives up all hope and drags himself out of bed.

The darkness of his room is unusually oppressive, the only light coming from the luminescent green numbers of his alarm clock and the dim glow of streetlamps seeping through the cracks in the blinds. Normally he'd roll his eyes at the fact that his room isn't completely dark―he'd half-jokingly asked Sharon for blackout shades as a birthday gift, to which _of course_ she'd said no because he was "difficult enough to rouse as it is"―but tonight, he can't bring himself to care. In fact, he's almost grateful for the soft light because it gives him something other than darkness to stare at as he tosses and turns and twists himself deeper into his sheets, and when that fails to calm the underlying sense of unease thrumming beneath his skin, he sits upright with a frustrated sigh and scrubs a hand down his face. Every time he closes his eyes he sees graphite words and notebook pages held tightly in shaking hands, and in the silence of the room, Taylor and Rios' voices are still ringing in his ears.

It's enough to drive him crazy, and no matter what he tries, he just can't seem to make it stop.

The hour and twenty-seven minutes he spent in Chief Taylor's office has to go down as one of the most nerve-wracking measures of time he's endured in his life. Even considering the fact that he's been through a lot in his seventeen years on the planet―and he's willing to concede that point, though he's doing just fine and he _totally doesn't need a damn shrink, Sharon_―there's not much he can remember that compares to the complete panic and terror he'd felt at having his whole future up in the air yet again. It had been all he could do to stay in his chair and not pace the floor or throw up on Taylor's desk; honestly, he's not even sure what was said beyond the fact that every time he heard the words "witness protection", he put up what he can only hope was a coherent protest. Sharon had been prepared enough for the both of them, however―which really shouldn't have been surprising to him after a year and a half of living under the same roof. Though he can't remember exactly what she'd said, it had evidently been enough to keep him safely in her custody, and in the process of appeasing Chief Taylor, he thinks she may have, in no certain terms and not as many words, told Emma Rios she could politely go to hell. All in all, despite the seriousness of the situation and the high emotional stakes, the fact that he's sitting here on _his _bed in _his _room right now should feel like a win.

But it doesn't, and that worries him, and he can't help thinking that the other shoe's about to drop.

He disentangles himself from the blankets and swings his legs over the side of the bed, head falling heavily into his hands. It shouldn't be this complicated, he thinks bitterly, a half-formed and entirely sardonic laugh huffing past his lips. He shouldn't have to worry about letters or threats or serial killers or exceedingly horrible deputy district attorneys. If they want him to testify, that should be it: he should be able to take the stand, say his piece, and get on with his life. When he'd started this whole ordeal, _that's_ what he'd signed up for―he'd say whatever they wanted him to say in court, and in return, they would find his mother. Those had been the conditions of the deal. But because life seemed to be intent on screwing him over at every given opportunity, he was splitting his time between a police station and a police state, awaiting a trial that would _never freaking begin_, and the police hadn't held up their end of the deal because…

The thought makes his throat tighten, and he swallows hard against it.

He pushes himself up off the mattress and paces the floor. The police _had_ held up their end of the deal―that's the part that even now presses like a lead weight against his ribs. Sharon and the rest of the Major Crimes unit had done everything in their power to reunite him with his mother: they'd put out APBs, and put in money for a bus ticket, and offered to foot the bill for a hotel room just so she'd have a place to stay while they got the whole custody situation worked out, but in the end none of that had mattered because his mother had ditched him once again for five hundred dollars and the latest asshole in a long line of loser boyfriends, and _that's _the part that hurts more than he can ever admit out loud. He wants to hate her for it; he's honestly _tried_, because his messed up situation isn't Sharon's fault and it isn't Buzz or Flynn or Provenza's fault and it isn't even Brenda's fault despite the fact that she could have shot Stroh just _one more time _and ended the nightmare for everybody. No: what bothers him the most about the whole thing is that even now, even after knowing that he matters less to his mother than some paltry sum of money, he can't hate her, because before the crack and the alcohol and the sex, she was his _mother_, and she _loved _him, and he can't let go of that. He doesn't even know how to _begin_, because what kind of person _does _that, actually lets themselves love somebody, then walks away from them like it never even _mattered_?

_Sharon might know_.

The thought catches him entirely off guard, and eyes widening in realization, he stops dead still.

The voice in his head falls strangely silent, but it's enough to start his mind whirring. Sharon, who's been abandoned by her douchebag of a husband more than once. Sharon, who's raised two kids maybe entirely on her own and deigned to give him a roof over his head even though he didn't ask and he isn't hers. Sharon, who'd stoically absorbed every terrible thing he could hurl at her in his first few weeks of living here, because he'd been afraid and frustrated and _angry_ and she was the only one left to take the blow. It's never dawned on him to question her motives before, because at the start she was the Captain and he was the witness and she was just doing her job, but now that he's become _Rusty_ and she's become _Sharon_ and they've begun to see each other as just _them_, he can't help but wonder if part of the reason she's been so patient and supportive and caring with him is because, on some level, she _understands_. She may not have lived on the streets or taken Johns or become a witness to a serial rape and murder, but he thinks she understands what it's like to love someone and watch it go to waste.

She'd told him she loved him tonight, the stack of his letters clenched tightly in her hand. Before, he'd only ever heard it from his mother, and she obviously didn't mean it. But with Sharon, the feeling he has bubbling up inside him is _panic_, because he's worried that she meant it…but he's terrified that she didn't, and if she ends up walking away from him too, he's not sure he can survive it twice.

His stomach churns, and bile claws its way up his throat. If he doesn't calm down he's going to puke, and he really doesn't want to explain to Sharon why he's hanging over a toilet at two sixteen a.m.

The darkness seems to get heavier by the second as he stands there in the middle of the floor. Claustrophobia sweeps over him in a sudden wave; if he's not going to be sleeping tonight, there's no way he can stay in this room, not with the TV in the living room and one of his sci-fi shows on the DVR and the need to get out of his own head powerful enough to make him consider running for the hills and never coming back. He doesn't like what he's thinking, but he can't make it stop, and the chaotic whirl in his skull is too much for him to endure.

_Danger to the witness. Relocation. Protective custody. Disregard for personal safety or wellbeing. Refuses to cooperate. Vital testimony. Child. Whorephan._

_Whatever happens next, know I love you._

He needs a distraction, but he's not going to find it here in the dark. So damning the consequences―because Sharon may love him, but she _will _kill him if she finds out he's broken one of her oh-so-precious curfew rules―he takes a deep breath, twists the lock, and decides to look elsewhere for much-needed peace.

* * *

The floorboards are cool to his bare feet as he pads almost silently down the hallway. A quick glance over his shoulder tells him Sharon's bedroom door is closed―not that he was expecting anything different, but he hasn't seen her since the uncomfortably silent ride back from the station, and he knows she's hyper-vigilant enough to check up on him if she so much as hears a floorboard creak. He's really not much for company right now, so he does his best to tread lightly; he cares about her, he does, but every time he thinks about her, all he sees is the look of mixed disappointment and resignation on her face as they stood outside Taylor's office, and it's enough to make his stomach churn again, and…

Dammit, he needs to _stop _this, or he really _will _be spilling his guts. All over the floor.

He stops thinking and continues sneaking.

He's just reached the end of the hall when it dawns on him that one of the lights in the kitchen is on. Now, _this _isan unusual occurrence; he pauses a little and edges carefully into the living room, eyes squinting against the dimmed light. When he'd first come to stay here and had accidentally left the kitchen light on a few times after getting a glass of water in the middle of the night, Sharon had politely but firmly asked him to remember to flip the switch off again on his way out. For her to make the same mistake is just _weird_, because he knows _he_ didn't do it, having retreated to his room the moment they set foot in the door, and Sharon's too OCD about consistency and routine and _rules_ not to remember to turn the light off before going to bed, and if she's forgotten that, he can't help but wonder what had her so preoccupied, and―

About halfway through that rambling thought he realizes Sharon's sitting _right in front of him_ at the kitchen table, and for the second time in five minutes, he stops dead in his tracks.

For a moment, he thinks she's heard him―her back is to him, so he knows she hasn't seen his approach unless she actually _does _have eyes in the back of her head―but when she doesn't acknowledge his presence or even turn around, he knows he's somehow managed to escape her powers of observation, and he slowly allows himself to relax. Her attention seems to be focused on what's on the table in front of her rather than _him_―paperwork, he guesses, though he can't really tell from his vantage point. A mug of something rests to her right on the wood surface; she's angled slightly to the left and hunched over what looks like a couple stacks of organized papers with a few pages scattered at random before her. All in all he's only partially surprised that she's even up right now, because she's not exactly a "leave 'til tomorrow what you can do today" kind of person―but it _is _well past two a.m., and given that this departure from her normal routine is so out of character it almost provides cause for concern, he can't help but be a little suspicious.

That being said, he also realizes that if he's going to sneak out of here without getting caught, doing so while she's got her mind and eyes on something else would probably be a smart idea. He treads quietly back from whence he came, casting sidelong glances at her every few steps to make sure she still hasn't seen him.

He makes it halfway to the hall when he sees her shoulders hook. When that first tremor is followed by a second smaller one, he freezes on the spot for an entirely different reason.

At first he thinks he imagined it as he watches her slowly close the file and push it aside. Her glasses clatter almost soundlessly against the tabletop, one arm curling protectively around her waist as the other rises to press a hand against her mouth. If he hadn't seen the tell-tale hitch in her abnormally rigid posture, he would have never given her a second glance; but when she folds in on herself, shoulders trembling against the weight of restrained emotion, there's no question in his mind as to what he's witnessing, and the thought makes his eyes widen and his heart drop like a lead weight in his chest. _Sharon Raydor, Captain Rulebook and the LAPD's resident ice queen, is _crying_._

He swallows hard, and a wave of ice-cold fear runs inexplicably through his veins.

He's seen his mother cry before, a thousand different times for a thousand stupid reasons. On the nights when she was wasted or high, when her bed was empty and the apartment was devoid of any male presence but him, she'd weep ugly, whiskey-soaked tears into his shoulder and ask over and over again why nothing could turn out right for her, why the latest asshole had abandoned her, why he couldn't just _be nice _because beating the crap out of her jerk of an ex had only made things worse and now they were alone again and it was somehow _his fault. _He'd come to hate her tears because they were a sign of weakness, and he'd gone so far as to hide his own because he couldn't stand the thought of someone seeing him as _weak._ But Sharon's _not_ his mother―she's not drunk, or stoned, or weak, and somehow, the mere sight of tears has never affected him―scared him―quite like this does. His mother's drunken sobs were one thing, but this is _Sharon_. She never cries, she never loses it, she barely ever flinches. To see her weeping silently into an empty room makes him understand with startling clarity that she's _not_ as invincible as he's somehow thought her to be; though she may act like Superwoman, there are times when even her cape comes off and her superpowers just don't work anymore. This may be the first time he's ever seen her truly cry, but as he watches her stifle a sob with the back of her hand, he can't help but wonder just how much practice she's had when no one was looking.

A lump rises in his throat, and he clenches his hands into fists. He needs to get out of here before she sees him, because he's not sure he could explain why he's standing here if he tried, and he's entirely sure he doesn't _want _to try. If she's crying like this, late at night and in the open, something must be wrong.

He needs to move. He doesn't need to see this.

"…Sharon?"

Unfortunately, his mouth has other ideas.

* * *

The word tears itself unbidden out of his throat. It's out in the open before he can stop it, hanging in the empty air as if in suspended animation. He can't tell for certain, but he's pretty sure he's doing a convincing impression of a deer in the headlights right now.

Sharon, however, hasn't noticed, because she's very pointedly _not looking_ at _him_.

She seems to start slightly at the sound of his voice, but she stops short of actually jumping, her back going ramrod straight with little visible effort at all. She replaces her glasses and subtly wipes at her eyes. "Rusty," she says, her normally-soothing alto cadence unsteady; he wonders if she knows her voice always gives her away. She clears her throat. "What are you doing up?"

He opens his mouth to answer, but suddenly becomes thankful that she hasn't faced him yet because he really has no good explanation as to _why_ he's standing here, and he thinks saying _"I was trying to avoid a panic attack"_ would only add to whatever it is that's worrying her. Instead, he settles for a (hopefully believable) "Couldn't sleep," and watches her nervously rearrange the papers on the tabletop before her. He shoves his hands deep into his pajama pants pockets. "What are you doing?"

She shoots him a thin smile over her shoulder as she pushes herself out of the chair, but he thinks it would be more convincing if he couldn't see the residue of tear tracks catching moonlight on her too-pale skin. "Oh, it's… Paperwork," she offers by way of explanation, but she doesn't elaborate further and he doesn't ask. Honestly he's not sure _what _he should do at this point; he's completely out of his depth and _why oh why did he have to go and open his big mouth?_

Sharon saves him the trouble of coming up with a reply. She takes the half-empty mug of _something_ (he's guessing cold tea) over to the sink and dumps it out, refilling the kettle in the same motion. "I was just about to make some more tea," she says, as if that somehow explains why she's up crying over paperwork at two and a half hours past midnight. On tiptoes, she reaches up to the cabinet and grabs a tea box. "Would you like some?"

He almost tells her no, because quite honestly he doesn't even _like _tea, but it occurs to him that if he says no she'll send him back to the room he just escaped from, and if he goes back, he won't be able to figure out what's wrong. Against his better judgment, he nods. "Sure."

He watches her rummage through the cabinet again, hoping she'll find something better tasting than that godawful herbal stuff she seems to favor, but when her fingers clench around a packet of hot chocolate instead, his eyebrows shoot up into his hairline. If Sharon's _giving _him sugar and caffeine at this ungodly hour something's definitely up, and an uneasy feeling settles itself uncomfortably in the pit of his stomach.

He racks his brain to come up with something to fill the awkward silence between them. "So…" _Dammit, he's grasping at straws here_. "How…was your case?"

The line of her shoulders tenses ever so slightly at his question, but she answers him, albeit reluctantly. "It's closed."

There's a touch of something he can't identify in her voice. He frowns. "Did you catch the guy?"

_That _provokes a response, though not the one he was expecting. She slumps forward a bit, almost defeated; her back is to him again as she fiddles with the kettle on the stove, but he thinks he's poking at something she really doesn't want to talk about, and that takes him by surprise because she's never been incredibly reticent about discussing her work with him in the past. "No," she says after a pause. "No, if anything, he caught himself." She drops a teabag into one mug and fills the other with hot chocolate mix if for no other reason than to keep her hands busy. "The idea of facing a possible death sentence or at the very least life in prison didn't…appeal to him. We were told that he might have a gun, but…"

Rusty feels his eyes widen. "So, wait, you mean he…_shot_ himself?"

"Unfortunately, yes."

His jaw slackens the tiniest bit. Somehow he wasn't prepared for _that_; the whole idea of pressing a gun to his head just to get away from his problems sends a cold shudder down his spine, and he can't understand why anyone would _ever _go that route. If Sharon witnessed it, however, that might explain why she's so off tonight, and he winces a little at the thought. "God. I…I'm sorry."

"Don't be." She smiles at him, but it's tired, and more than a little sad. "Sometimes, there are things in life that are just beyond our control. People make bad decisions, and though we may know what they're choosing is wrong, sometimes there's…nothing we can do about it." She sighs. "No matter how much we may want to."

Rusty shrugs and lets his eyes drop to the floor, toeing at an imaginary scuff mark and shifting uncomfortably. "Yeah." He doesn't know if she meant them to or not, but her words hit a pretty sensitive area, flashing him back to the stack of letters in her hand and the decision he'd made to hide them. He hadn't meant to hurt her―he hadn't meant to hurt _anyone_, but the idea of being taken out of the only home he's had in years, giving up his newfound family and friends, letting go of any chance to be reunited with his mother should she come looking for him… He couldn't do it. Surely Sharon understands that…

Right?

The notion that she doesn't scares him. The more he thinks about it, the less certain he is of anything; they hadn't even spoken to each other after leaving Taylor's office, except for a couple short questions about whether he was hungry (he wasn't), and whether he was sure (he was). They were in that meeting for an hour and a half, but never once did he explain anything―he'd been too terrified and numb to. Sharon's pretty good at reading him most of the time, but even she's not infallible. What if she missed this, the one thing he really needs her to understand?

She presses a mug of hot chocolate into his hands without warning. She must have finished it while he was lost in his head, but suddenly he doesn't think he can stomach the sweetness and he sets the beverage on the breakfast bar. She's standing across from him, leaning against the counter and staring down into her own mug of tea, and he doesn't really want to talk about it when everything's so up in the air and she's already on shaky ground emotionally, but he needs her to know why he did what he did and that he's sorry. He needs to know that she'll forgive him for doing to _her_ the one thing she promised she'd never do to _him_, and maybe he doesn't have the right to ask for reassurances right now, but he wants to anyway. Taking a deep breath, he swallows hard and forces words past the lump in his throat.

"So what…what happens now?"

Sharon glances up at him, surprised, the lenses of her glasses slightly fogged. He doesn't think she expected him to say anything, but she recovers quickly and wraps her hands more firmly around her mug. "Now?" She pauses. "Now, there's not much we can do. We've closed the case, and there won't be an arrest or a deal or a trial, so there's not much we can offer the families except―"

"No," he cuts her off suddenly, "No, that's not…" He breaks off with a huff and scratches nervously at the back of his neck. "I mean…what happens to us now, now that you guys know about the…"―he swallows―"the letters?"

He braces himself for a thinly-veiled lecture, or that disappointed look to make its way back across her features, but when her head tips back to fix her eyes on the ceiling and she murmurs "I don't know, Rusty," in the unsteadiest voice he's heard since she first started pretending that she wasn't crying, he feels the tendrils of panic bloom like a poisonous weed in his chest. "I don't know," she repeats after a long moment. "I wish I did, but I can't…I can't _say_ for sure."

He shakes his head, stunned. "Wait…wait, what do you _mean_, '_you don't know'_?" he implores her, voice unusually choked and strained, words spilling out like water through a floodgate. "I…I thought that…that I was getting to _stay_ _here_, with you; I mean, Taylor didn't put me in protective custody, and I'm still _here, _and you… You promised you wouldn't let them take me, Sharon!"

Her eyes are wide now, the green of her irises even more piercing in the moonlight. "I know, Rusty, and I promise you, you are not going _anywhere _without a fight, but there are still things that Chief Taylor and I need to discuss, and there are probably going to be some changes that we'll have to make, but―"

"_Changes?"_ He fixes her with a stare. "What kind of changes?"

"Well…" she winces, hands stretching out towards him placatingly, almost as if she's afraid he's going to fly off the handle, "we're going to have to put new security protocols in place; limit the amount of time you spend outside of home and the office. You'll probably have to take most of your classes online this semester, and DDA Rios made mention of hiring a security detail to―"

"_A security detail?!"_ he echoes incredulously, furiously: "God, Sharon, _what the hell?_"

"_Rusty,"_ she pleads, her voice firm and shaky all in the same breath. "I don't think you understand just how much _danger _you put yourself in. What if you'd―"

Something inside him snaps, and suddenly all the pent-up terror and rage and pain comes pouring out, and it takes everything he has not to _scream_ at her because nobody understands and he just can't seem to _make_ them no matter how hard he tries. _"Danger?" _he laughs; the sound is grating and frightening in the stillness of the room, but it desperately needs release, and he's powerless to stop it. "Sharon, I'm not in _'danger'_, here; I was _'in danger'_ living on the streets last year and nobody cared, I was _'in danger'_ whoring myself out to Johns every night and you guys didn't give a damn, and I was _'in danger' _watching some psychopath try to bury a girl he'd raped and murdered, but nobody cared until I became a _'valuable asset'_, and if you guys didn't need me for that stupid _trial_,_ nobody _would give a crap about me even now!"

The look on her face is a study in anguish. "Rusty…"

"I didn't a_sk _for this!" He's pacing now, back and forth, hands dragging through his hair, whole body participating in his tirade. "I didn't _ask _to become a witness―this wasn't part of the_ deal_, you guys were just supposed to find my mother and that was _it_, and now you're trying to put me in a cage―"

"Rusty―"

"―lock me up like I'm some…_criminal_, take away _the rest of my life _when I've only just now gotten it back―"

"Rusty, _please _just listen―"

"―because another whack-job wants to scare me out of testifying, and… _God, _why does this have to keep happening to _me?_ Maybe I _should _have let Stroh beat my head in with a shovel and throw me off a cliff, because _anything w_ould be a hell of a lot better than living like _this_!"

He knows he went too far before the sentence ever leaves his mouth. He _knows_, and he regrets it immediately, but in that split second before his eyes go wide and his mouth cracks shut, he sees Sharon's mask crumble and twin sets of tears cascade their way down her face, and in that moment, that terrible, _terrible _instant, all the pieces finally click into place, and he knows_ exactly _why she was weeping the moment he walked into the room.

Sharon spins away from him, her hands holding tight enough to the granite countertop to turn her knuckles ghost white, her fingers trembling so badly that they send shockwaves up her arms and shake the tense line of her shoulders as she hunches desperately over the counter. He hears her breathe _"God," _into the stale air of the room, though whether it's a prayer or a plea he doesn't know; a choked whimper sounds deep in the back of her throat and she hangs onto the countertop for dear life. All he can see is the jut of her shoulder blades quaking against her robe, and he can only stare in horrified shock as those silent tears become barely audible sobs, and he wishes with everything in him he could take it all back, but wishing's not enough, and _God, why does he keep hurting the people he cares about the most?_

He starts hesitantly toward her, his eyes wet and his face hot. "Sharon," he croaks, throat suddenly raw. "I'm so sorry… I-I didn't mean…"

Though it seems like an eternity, it's really less than a minute before the tremors stop and she raises her eyes to the ceiling, hand swiping beneath her glasses in the gesture of someone begging him not to notice. She waits until she's regained at least a semblance of her composure before she faces him, but when she does, she looks so _awful_ that his eyes begin to burn. He knows he's driven her to tears before―back when his sperm donor showed up and he'd accused her of wanting to get rid of him, she'd ducked from the room before she lost all hold on her control―but that had been _nothing _compared to this, and knowing he'd hurt her enough to make her cry was one thing, but actually _witnessing _it, seeing the fallout from his sharp tongue and bitter words…this is something else. He's been toeing the line since he met her to see how far he could push, but this time he knows he's done way more than cross it.

_(Is this the point where even she decides he's not worth it anymore?)_

Then suddenly, Sharon clears her throat.

"I know…that this situation is not ideal for anyone." He looks up at her, startled by the sound of her voice and the fact that she's speaking to him at all. "I know that being a witness in a murder trial is hard, and that you are being required to do things you would rather not do. I realize how difficult that is for you, Rusty; I _understand._" She pauses, her gaze piercing right through him. "But there are things I need for _you_ to understand as well, because you are in an extremely high-risk situation right now, and honey, I really don't think you know how much danger you're in."

He swallows guiltily. "Sharon, I'm sorry. I just…I didn't think…"

"I know," she interrupts. "I know you didn't intend for this to happen. It's my fault for letting things get this far. But you _cannot_ keep making poor decisions in regard to your safety, because there are _consequences _to those decisions that neither you nor _we _are prepared for, and if anything, _anything_ were to happen to you, I'd―"

She breaks off just as her voice begins to waver. For a split second he thinks she's going to cry again, but just as quickly as that vulnerability becomes manifest, it vanishes, and she takes a deep breath that seems to fortify her as she continues on with her speech. "Your safety is of the utmost importance to me, to the unit, and to Chief Taylor and DDA Rios, whether you believe it or not. Any decisions we make regarding new security protocols or restricted activities are _not_ an attempt to ruin your life, no matter how it may seem to you; we are doing our _best_ to keep you out of harm's way. And I promise you," she murmurs lowly, "I _promise _that I will not let _anyone _take you out of my custody unless I am _sure _there is no other way to keep you safe. But I _need _you to meet me halfway, Rusty, because when I walk into Chief Taylor's office tomorrow to discuss our options further, it won't do either of us any good to make a deal if you're only going to disregard the agreement every step of the way."

His palms are sweaty as he wipes them on the flannel of his pants, a fresh wave of fear sending icy chills to freeze the moisture gathering down his back and at his neck. "So what do I do?"

She locks eyes with him. "You can promise me that no matter what happens tomorrow, no matter if Chief Taylor assigns a protection detail or a restricted curfew or anything short of complete _house_ _arrest_, that you won't fight it and you'll _stay. safe,_ because I've already watched one boy who thought he had it all under control die tonight, and I _refuse_ to let you go down the same path."

The lump that rises in his throat threatens to choke him as he stares back at her, wide-eyed, mind a whirl of chaos. He'd never once considered the possibility that his life could actually be at stake; he's dealt with scare tactics before, dealt with lies and guilt and bruises and manipulation, but he's never truly given thought to the notion that he's anything less than untouchable now, and for a brief moment, it terrifies him.

But then he looks at Sharon, _really_ looks at her, and realizes with a start that _none _of these thoughts have just randomly occurred to her. Unlike him, she's actually been _thinking _about what these letters mean, and that revelation twists like a knife deep in his gut. She _knows _what could happen, what they're up against; knows what frustrations she might and quite probably _will _have to endure to keep him here, but instead of running for the hills, instead of doing the exact same thing his mother did, she's asked only that he make her a promise to accept the changes that could keep him safe―or at the very least, _try_. She's already given him more than his own flesh and blood ever has.

How can he tell her no?

She gazes at him with wet eyes behind her glasses. He nods until his throat clears and he can once again give her words. "I'll try," he says hoarsely, "I can't promise I'll be…_perfect _all the time, but I'll try."

"That's good," she smiles, and sags a little in relief. "That's all I can ask."

She looks at him a few more short moments before she comes back to herself, glances across the room at the clock on the wall. "It's really getting late," she says, bustling around the kitchen, a little awkward and possibly uncomfortable under his gaze, dumping out untouched mugs of long-cold tea and hot chocolate and rinsing the cups beneath the water's spray. "You need to try to some sleep, all right?"

Rusty nods, though he knows there'll be little rest for him tonight. "Yeah. Yeah, I guess I should…go." He pauses. "Are you, umm…"

She cocks her head slightly, then suddenly realizes what he's trying to ask and replies, "Oh. Oh, don't worry about me, Rusty, I'll go to bed once I'm finished in here. You go on and get some rest; I'll see you in the morning."

Her hand twitches up towards him for a moment, almost like she wants to touch him but thinks better of it and holds herself back. Though he's seen her do it before, tonight, the nearly-missed gesture almost hurts, and though she turns away and he starts to leave, for reasons he can't _(and doesn't really want to)_ explain, his feet lead him back, and he takes a deep breath before steeling himself and tentatively calling her name. "Sharon?"

She looks up at him. "Yes?"

When he realizes that for the first time in his life, what he's being offered doesn't come at a price, he takes two giant steps towards her, wraps his arms around her, and tries not to panic when she stiffens at his touch―but once the shock wears off, she embraces him back just as tightly, and she's small and solid and warm in his arms, and he almost feels safe here, and guilty because of it, so he turns his face into her hair and whispers the only thing he can. "I'm sorry."

"Oh, honey, I know," she whispers back, and as her hands form soothing circles on his shoulder blades, he feels himself slowly start to relax. "I know."

He releases her after a few more seconds, and she offers him a bittersweet smile, and he returns it as best he can while still feeling nervous and unsettled and awkward.

But in the morning, when she walks out of Taylor's office with a relieved and somewhat-victorious expression on her face, the weight _finally_ falls off his chest, and he's free enough to give her a full-blown grin.

* * *

…_Remember all the words I said,_

_Be still_

_Be still_

_And know._


End file.
